...and I've played it for a few hours. The game looks gorgeous, sounds awesome, and gunplay generally is a lot of fun. On a technical level, it's everything you want it be. But yeah, the progression system is pretty shit. On average you're earning 250 credits a game if you're having a decent game at best. With crates costing 4000 credits, it's a slow grindy way to progress. Then you get random fucken cards which really screw up with your motivation to level up a particular class. I'm currently focussing on the assault class, and the crates I've earned/opened have given me ZERO assault cards. And I will never, ever, pay real money for anything in-game. It's pretty insulting to get hero cards when I never even get near playing a hero.

That's another gripe: the battlepoints system was in theory a great change from the pickup system they had in BF 2015. But then the costs of heroes are ridiculous. The closest I got to playing a hero was when I had 95% of the required battle points with about 15 seconds left.

When will developers learn that to keep players interested, you need to consistently reward them for the time they spend (positive reinforcement). Grinding towards a goal is going about it the wrong way (negative reinforcment). Blizzard did it with Diablo 3. So did Ubisoft with The Division. Who knows what EA will do.

I finished the campaign yesterday and have to say I really enjoyed it apart from a few bugs (glitchy cutscenes mostly), but it was way too short and could have used a better variety of missions. That being said I really enjoyed the flying parts of the game.

I'm enjoying the campaign currently... And the arcade matches were good fun. Even the single MP game I have had was fun. I can see getting new cards being a slow grind, but I'm not that worried since I don't care about being too competitive.

Agree Disco in that the flying is fun, I really hope they make a newer version of X-Wing vs Tie Fighter. The flying would be perfect

Just got to where you join the Rebels. Gotta say though, that I a enjoying playing as the main chick more than any of the heroes so far. Leia felt useless, IMO.

You can earn crates for free - I haven't felt those that have heroes that I don't yet are more OP than me. The game is fine. I don't know what everyone is kicking up a big stink over - I mean suuuure you gotta unlock content - but you can unlock it for free so...?

I'm enjoying the campaign currently... And the arcade matches were good fun. Even the single MP game I have had was fun. I can see getting new cards being a slow grind, but I'm not that worried since I don't care about being too competitive.

Agree Disco in that the flying is fun, I really hope they make a newer version of X-Wing vs Tie Fighter. The flying would be perfect

Just got to where you join the Rebels. Gotta say though, that I a enjoying playing as the main chick more than any of the heroes so far. Leia felt useless, IMO.

You can earn crates for free - I haven't felt those that have heroes that I don't yet are more OP than me. The game is fine. I don't know what everyone is kicking up a big stink over - I mean suuuure you gotta unlock content - but you can unlock it for free so...?

I think the point is that while you can unlock it for free eventually, under the usual model somebody can whip out a credit card and get an instant advantage over you. Never mind heroes, some of the cards are simply a straight buff to a common class. Pay to win is not a great system.

Edit: Also predatory gambling thing which is bad for those who have problems with such.

You can earn crates for free - I haven't felt those that have heroes that I don't yet are more OP than me. The game is fine. I don't know what everyone is kicking up a big stink over - I mean suuuure you gotta unlock content - but you can unlock it for free so...?

I think the point is that while you can unlock it for free eventually, under the usual model somebody can whip out a credit card and get an instant advantage over you. Never mind heroes, some of the cards are simply a straight buff to a common class. Pay to win is not a great system.

Edit: Also predatory gambling thing which is bad for those who have problems with such.

I think also the long grind to gaining enough in game currency to unlock a hero was another key factor (at least what it was originally before EA dropped the prices by a huge % ). It seems clear this was intentional to make people want to pay money for loot crates.

In a free to play game like Heroes of the Storm, Loot Crates and microtransactions make sense. You can unlock the content over time or you can speed up the process (like I have) and spend $5-20 here and there. I've spent about $80 overall over time which is about the cost of a game and have honestly gotten my money's worth. Would I pay more, no... I drew the line at the cost of a game.

But getting players to pay top dollar for a AAA title and then weaseling in microtransactions is just double dipping.

Was just watching this video below and the research/trend analysis for EA the guy makes is quite interesting. Simply put, their greed has gotten the best of them.

Hopefully EA will learn from what Blizzard did with D3 via patch 2.0 and onwards, and apply it to Battlefront 2.

Blizzard was absolutely crucified for putting shackles on the gameplay in order to support their monetisation model. But they recovered. The question is, will EA?

I didn't have a bad time with D3 during the vanilla days... I think I have a decent understanding of wealth creation and the discipline that comes with it so my in game gold and even real money balance went up during those two years. But if the number of crumby items I sold at the $2-5 range was any indication, there's a lot of people out there who will dump money into microtransactions for instant gratification. And gaming shouldn't encourage this.

I didn't have a bad time with D3 during the vanilla days... I think I have a decent understanding of wealth creation and the discipline that comes with it so my in game gold and even real money balance went up during those two years. But if the number of crumby items I sold at the $2-5 range was any indication, there's a lot of people out there who will dump money into microtransactions for instant gratification. And gaming shouldn't encourage this.

This is the controversy surrounding microtransactions / loot boxes, especially the way EA has presented it. The anticipation of the crate opening, the flash cards spinning before your eyes, then you having to actually click to reveal what cards you have. I have no doubt it has been carefully planned and crafted to appeal to the pleasure centres in your brain, much like the positive feeedback you get from a pokie machine. Whilst I acknowledge personal responsibility is important, these sorts of elements have infested mainstream gaming.

I tried MP briefly last night and was having fun, wasn't very good at the starships game though lol

It's takes getting used to.
Took me a while to get used to the flying mechanic in BF1 then I was dominating the skies. It's not too different in BF2, slight adjustments which at the beginning was causing me to barrel roll into a cliff or the ground or whatever - it's hard to explain what they've done in BF2 but yeah.. you'll adjust haha.

What platform is everyone mostly playing this on? I'm playing it on PS4.
It definitely helps playing with a controller for this game mode.

I'm on PC, and fly with the mouse and keyboard just fine.
Actually enjoy it, but I think that is because I played so much Freelancer years ago and have got used to the controls.
I also play Elite Dangerous that way, so I may be weird.

Couldn't believe it, played as a hero (Luke) for the first time tonite. I had quite a decent run beforehand, but it feels like getting enough Battlepoints to play as a hero is more of a once in a blue moon sort of thing than a typical part of the game.

Couldn't believe it, played as a hero (Luke) for the first time tonite. I had quite a decent run beforehand, but it feels like getting enough Battlepoints to play as a hero is more of a once in a blue moon sort of thing than a typical part of the game.

Which is fine, as the Heroes are insanely powerful, so if one appears on your team it's more like a treat. I don't like it when there's too many heroes running about.

Couldn't believe it, played as a hero (Luke) for the first time tonite. I had quite a decent run beforehand, but it feels like getting enough Battlepoints to play as a hero is more of a once in a blue moon sort of thing than a typical part of the game.

Which is fine, as the Heroes are insanely powerful, so if one appears on your team it's more like a treat. I don't like it when there's too many heroes running about.

Which then makes the idea of locking heroes behind credits even more ridiculous.